Evening Star
by Juliet's Cats
Summary: Twilight with a twist. A story about Vampires in Australia, and their friendship with the Cullen's. Includes slight spoilers up to and including the fourth book. First fanfic, please review.
1. Chapter 1

**Original characters and any mistakes are mine, anything you recognise belongs to Stephanie Meyer.**

Prologue

My world is awash with green.

It's a nice change. For too long now, the only colour I have seen has been a blood red. But even this change in the colour palate of my life could not distract me for long, as my eyes stared forward unseeingly at the forest that surrounded me. Even though I could see every leaf on every tree that I passed, even though I was able to pick out the fine veins that ran through them as they rustled in the slight breeze that also swept my grey coat out majestically behind me, the beauty of this place that I had once called home failed to touch me. My mind, for so long completely numb but this morning painfully sharp, was far too concerned with other things to be worried about the living sea that surrounded me.

The rhythmic footsteps of my colleagues, far too quiet for humans to hear, reminds me of my long-absent heart beat. It is an unusual sensation, feeling the pulsing vibration rush through my body once more. Were I not so acutely aware of where I was and who surrounded me, I may have even been able to pretend that I was still alive. Not that I wished for that - not now. It was no small blessing that my heart had long since perished, otherwise it would break with what was about to pass today. Because today I would have to make a sacrifice far too great for me to make. Today I would kill those I had once called my family, all for the sake of the one that I loved. Even with the black void that filled where my soul once rested, I could not pretend that these events did not concern me. I was all too aware that I deserved death far more than those I would bestow it upon, and yet I did nothing to prevent this from occurring. I just kept marching forward, in perfect unison with those that surrounded me, closing the distance between me and a destiny that no one deserved.

I continued to watch as the scene surrounding me continued to brighten, as we approached the clearing that our targets had lead us to. It took only a few more minutes to break through the bank of trees and enter a grassy meadow, only for my eyes to meet those of who were waiting for me. My eyes only paused briefly on each set of golden eyes that stared back at me. Emmett, Rosalie, Jasper, Alice, Esme, Carlisle, Edward and Bella, none of these familiar faces held my empty gaze for long. What was there to hold on to? Even if I could appreciate the emotions that played within those topaz depths, it would not change what was about to pass. I had made my decision, long before any of these events had unfolded, and I would not change it now.

And because of that, the Cullens had to die.

1. Endings and Beginnings

I sat, staring at the computer monitor, as I read over and over again the words displayed on screen, and I felt a smile slowly creep across my face. Offers for intern places had just come out, and I had been accepted for all three that I had applied for. Now I just had to pick one.

I realised as I looked at the three very different options in front of me, that I had three very different reasons for applying for them. The first intern position was at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, the institution where I had completed most of my training. I had applied for one here basically because I was fairly sure that I would be accepted, even if nowhere else wanted me. I have enjoyed the past six years that I have spent studying here in South Australia - a place I originally picked to study at for the sole reason of getting as far away from my parents as I could - and I feel no real aversion to remaining here.

Although I love my parents, on so many levels we are complete opposites. Skysong and Heartbeat, my mother and father, always tried to raise me with the same ideals they held, but like so many other children, my whole life I have felt the need to rebel against them. The only difference was that my rebellion was not going out and getting drunk and stoned, or sleeping around, or getting piercings (all of which my parents would probably have been proud for me to do), it was running away to medical school at sixteen. My whole life has been the opposite of what they hoped. I did well at school and embraced the institution, finishing year twelve a year younger than expected, with a perfect score. Getting into medical school in South Australia had just allowed me to escape my parents much sooner than would have been possible had I been accepted to a university in Queensland, where my parents and I had lived. Whilst my parents were disappointed that I was so in cahoots with "the man", they still allowed me to go. They told me this was because they hoped that the other teenagers at uni would corrupt me, but I think it was because it gave them a chance to finally move to Nimbin, one of the last strongholds of hippies in Australia, and open their organic vegetable farm. Either way, it doesn't really matter, and I have spent the past six years studying medicine and enjoying the freedom it has afforded me.

So option A was to stay at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, to continue to with the status quo, which seemed like a perfectly reasonable option to me. It would present me with career opportunities as much as any other institution. It was a safe choice. I liked safe.

The second intern position I had been offered was at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney, one of the most prestigious hospitals in the country. Any other medical student would probably give their left foot for this post (in fact, my boyfriend, Mark, would give more than his left foot…probably his whole leg), as it presented you with the best opportunity for learning and the best opportunity for specialisation. To me, I found this post to be less interesting than the one at the Royal Adelaide Hospital. I have never been interested in climbing the greasy pole. I have never felt the need to feel better than anyone else. My whole life I have been averse to competition (to be honest, it was mostly because I always won, which I always found made people less inclined to want to deal with me), and I knew that if I took this position, that would be exactly what I would be doing - competing. I had only applied to the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in the first place because Mark had wanted me to. He desperately wanted an intern position there. Mark loved the greasy pole. He lived for the thrill of competition. He was always bitterly disappointed when he came off second best, which he always did with me around. The only way he had managed to reconcile that with himself was when we had started dating. At least that way, he could say that his girlfriend was better than everyone else.

It wasn't Mark's fault that he was so competitive. His father was a world famous neurosurgeon, and his mother was the head of a neonatal intensive care unit. His whole life, he had been compared to his famous parents, and was always treated like he had to prove himself to them. As a result, he had developed a competitive streak, something that I now found quite endearing now it was no longer directed at me.

I sighed, knowing that when Mark found out that I had been offered a position at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, that there were only two possible responses he would give me.

1. He had not been offered an intern position there as well, at which point he would insist that I take the position at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, and try to convince me that it was not because he was bitterly disappointed that he hadn't been offered one.

2. He _had_ been offered an intern position, in which case he would be overtly happy that I was doing so well, and insist I take the position without considering my other options.

If I was being honest with myself, it was the third intern offer that I found most appealing. I hadn't even told Mark that I was applying for it, knowing too well that he would only ever humour my dream, then tell me how irresponsible it would be for me to follow it, if I ever considered it seriously.

My third offer was a remote area placement in Western Australia, in a small mining town called Keyes, three hours from Broome. I loved the idea of adventure associated with such a position. I also wanted to experience medicine hands-on, in a way that hadn't been available during my studies. The medical hierarchy meant that in most hospitals, there was always at least twenty people higher up the ladder than you, waiting for the interesting cases. Out in such a remote location, with only a few other doctors aside from myself, I was much more likely to be able to do hands-on work, and that appealed to me greatly. Besides which, access to health care in remote locations was always difficult, and I loved the idea of being able to help reduce that gap in some small way, even if as a novice, I would need to learn a lot to do so. Then again, learning had never been a problem for me before.

It was just then that I heard a knock on the door of my dorm room. I looked at the clock - if it was Mark, he was early. I dragged myself away from the computer screen to greet my mystery guest, only to find Mark standing there when I opened the door.

Mark was an extremely beautiful man. His emerald green eyes looked out at me from under his pitch black hair, that always seemed to be windblown. He was tall, but not gigantic, and he had the most beautiful smile. I always felt lucky to know I was with this man. Mark was a year older than me, but then again, everyone in my cohort was at least that. I could hardly believe my luck when he had asked me out in our third year - I had been so sure he hated me before that - but sure enough, right after my eighteenth birthday, he had asked me out, and we had never looked back.

"Hello, Kaia."

"Hey, Mark."

Mark stood there, watching me with anticipation, as though I had a line to deliver that I had forgotten. I sighed.

"What is it? What have I forgotten to ask?"

That perfect smile broke out across his face.

"Nothing. I was just wondering if you'd checked your email today. Intern offers are out."

I should have known it would have been something like that.

"Yeah, I did. I got offered three positions. How about you?"

"Yeah, I got offered two, but that doesn't really matter. What were you offered?"

"I was offered a spot at the Royal Adelaide, at the Royal Prince Alfred, and a remote area spot in Western Australia…"

"Royal Prince Alfred? That's fantastic, Kaia! We can be interns together!" He grasped my arms and swung me around, completely oblivious to the other two options.

"I haven't exactly decided that I'm going to the Alfred yet, Mark. I was sort of interested in going bush for a year…"

He stopped and looked me in the eyes, like he was looking for madness or something.

"Remote area? Why?"

I shrugged, "You're only young once. Besides, I want to try something different, get some hands on experience, and the need out there is so great…"

Mark shook his head at me, "I thought we had this conversation. You were going to intern at a major hospital, specialise, then - _if_ you still wanted to - you could locum out bush occasionally. You only get these chances once, Kaia. Don't waste them in a bout of immaturity."

"Immaturity? You think I want to do this cause I'm immature?"

"Well, it's hardly a mature decision, is it? Throwing away your future for twelve months of escapism."

"It's not escapism, it's what I want to do! What I did medicine to do. How can you be so dismissive of my dreams?"

"Kaia Snow, you are my girlfriend and I care for you. I don't want you out there roughing it in the outback and wasting your potential."

"I think I'm the one who should be worried about my potential, Mark," I insisted, "I would _never_ tell you what to do with your life. With your dreams."

"That's because my dreams aren't silly."

"Silly? Silly, are they?"

"Oh, don't be so melodramatic," he rolled his eyes at me, like I was a rebellious child.

I could feel the anger consuming me. I _hated_ it when he pulled this on me. Whenever I wanted to do something that he disagreed with, he pulled out the age card. He was older, ergo he was right.

"Well, I'm accepting the remote area position, Mark. Congratulations on your offer at the Alfred."

"Think about what you're doing, Kaia," he cautioned, "If you do this, well, that's the end of this relationship. If you're not going to take your future seriously, I can't see any other option. I can't be involved with someone so immature."

"Fine! Dump me," I spat, "Maybe _I_ don't want to be with someone who doesn't nurture my dreams or respect my feelings."

"Fine! Goodbye, Kaia."

And with that, Mark turned and walked out the door, slamming it behind him.

I was so consumed with rage that I couldn't speak, and shook my head, trying to dispel the tension. Temper was hardly my best asset, and both of us had more than enough to cover for the both of us. This was hardly our first fight. I guess you could say that Mark and I had a feisty relationship. Mark would call me back in the morning, all apologies. He would tell me it was okay and he should have respected my choice more, and I would tell him that he was right and I should go to the Royal Prince Alfred. It _was_ the more intelligent decision. Then we would kiss and make up and things would go back to the way they were before. That was how these things always went…

A week later, and Mark had still not called back. Evidently he was more mad at me than I had anticipated. I sighed. I had gotten over my anger at him that first night. My temper may be violent, but it was like a firecracker. One big explosion, then it was gone. Still, I had enough self-respect not to ring him till now. I wanted _him_ to be the one to call and apologise.

But a week? A week was a long time. Maybe this was serious. I hated to be the one to fold first, but I rang his mobile, only for it to go to his message box. I waited ten minutes, then called again (not wanting to look stalker-ish), but there was still no answer. I waited ten minutes more and called again. Still no answer.

I was frustrated, so I decided to go visit him at home. I took the bus to his suburb, then walked the five minutes to his house. I heard music on inside, coming from his room, so I decided to enter without knocking. I had a key, and it wasn't like I hadn't entered without knocking before. So I walked up the stairs to his room and opened his door…

…and that's where I saw him, his arms wrapped around a redhead I didn't know, their clothes strewn across the floor. I desperately tried not to acknowledge what they were doing, as I turned around and ran out, slamming the door behind me.

"Kaia!"

I kept moving, refusing to look backwards. My head spun.

_No, no, no, no, no…_

"Kaia," Mark grabbed my arm and spun me around to look at him. I could barely see him through my tears. I slapped him, hard. He didn't even acknowledge the pain that I had hoped to inflict upon him.

"You weren't meant to see that."

"Really? And here I thought it was a surprise for my birthday!"

"Is now really the best time to be facetious?"

"_Tell_ me, when would it be a good time?"

He sighed.

"Who is she, Mark?"

"No-one."

"She didn't look like no-one."

"She's no-one to me," he insisted, "I only just met her last night. It was a mistake."

"A mistake is an understatement."

"Don't you go judging me, Kaia Snow. This is your fault."

"My fault? How is me finding you in bed with another woman _my fault_?"

"Because you are the one who upset me so badly that I fell into the arms of another woman, and you are the one who has a no intimate contact policy."

"So it's my fault because I wouldn't sleep with you and because I wanted to follow my dreams?"

"Yes."

"No, Mark. This is _your_ fault. Even if I had decided that I wanted to quit medicine, it is _your duty_ to support me in that choice. And I only don't sleep with you because I don't like taking risks. You know what my family is like. I always told you when we married or when we got engaged, we would. You told me that was okay, that you wanted that too. Was that a lie?"

He just looked at me.

"How was the need to get laid suddenly so overwhelming? You've never talked to me about it…"

Then something clicked. Maybe he didn't talk about it because he was already getting it somewhere else.

I felt my breath come in brief gasps. The look on his face said it all.

"Get out," I growled, "I don't want to see you ever again. It's over."

"Kaia, this is my house," he didn't look concerned, only amused, like I was a child throwing a tantrum.

"Fine," I turned and stormed away, removing his key from my keychain. At the door, I turned and threw the key at him. "Goodbye, Mark."

I slammed the door and stormed away. As I walked through the front yard, I felt a wave of nausea wash over me and I threw up into the garden bed. After I was finished, I walked out of his yard and didn't stop walking. I walked all the way home. It took me over an hour. I walked up the flight of stairs to my dorm room, and switched on my computer.

I loaded up my email and sent an email to Western Australia.

Keyes, here I come.

I stared out of the window at the red earth below me. I could barely breathe with excitement, as I anticipated the adventure that awaited me when this small, cramped, Royal Flying Doctors Serve plane finally landed. I couldn't believe that the two months between me accepting the intern position in Keyes and today had gone so quickly. It seemed like almost a lifetime ago that I had uncovered Mark's extracurricular activities, ending that relationship and removing the only reason why I was hesitant about selecting this post. Mark had tried to make amends, of course. He had sent me flowers, sent me numerous text messages, and had even banged on my door a few times. I never replied - I had too much respect for myself for that. Mark had shown me the greatest disrespect during our time together, and I would never put up with being treated like that. I didn't need somebody like that in my life. I was always able to manage alone.

The only time that I have seen Mark since was at our graduation ceremony. Mark was dux of our cohort (of course), so I had no choice but to watch him as he gave his speech. It was fairly standard fare, but I still tried not to listen. Even though I was sure of my decision, it still hurt to see Mark and to hear his voice. It hurt even more to see that he looked to be doing a lot better than I had hoped he would. I was, however, able to distract myself with the excitement I felt at the coming year. What was graduation, anyway, but an ending? I was too excited about my future.

My parents were actually proud that I had decided to go remote rather than join "an institution". I guess, when you think about it, being a bush doctor is about as close to hippy as medicine gets…unless you decide to take up acupuncture or something. Pleasing my parents had almost made me wish I _had_ decided to accept the position at the Royal Prince Alfred.

Almost.

The sun was setting, as our plane finally landed on the dirt air strip. I climbed out with my meagre possessions, and looked towards the voluptuous woman standing by a Land Rover at the side of the airstrip. She waved me over.

She was sort of short, and probably looked a lot older than she should. Her brown hair was pulled back into a loose knot, and there was kindness in her eyes. When I reached her, she scooped me into a warm hug.

"Welcome to Keyes, Kaia Snow."

I pulled myself back and smiled at this motherly woman. This must have been Ruth Cox, director of nursing at Keyes Hospital.

"It's nice to be here."

We piled my belongings into the back of her car, before setting out towards town. As we drove, she gave me the low-down on Keyes.

"Keyes had a population of approximately one thousand people, even though technically speaking, there are probably only around two hundred permanent residents. The rest of the population are contracted out at the mine, or related to the people who work at the mine. They mine aluminium here, and I'm sure you'll see your fair share of mining related injuries. They're never as careful as they should be. We have a large indigenous population out here, around three hundred people if you include the surrounding communities. They are the Warrengibie. You'll probably have to do clinics out in the communities. Don't worry, you'll get to terms with their culture soon enough. Just remember, there's men's business and women's business. Don't stray outside your territory and they'll respect you. Maybe we'll actually manage to get some pap smear screening done now that we have a female doctor.

"There's only one hospital in Keyes. It currently has two doctors and now you. Dr Greg Young and Dr Oliver Monroe. Greg's a Perth boy born and bred. He came here locuming twenty years ago and never looked back. Oliver's an Englishman. Very nice chap, very bright. Closer to your age than mine. He doesn't do indigenous clinics, but then again, he's so busy with what he does he doesn't really have time to. He's a surgeon."

As I listened to Ruth yell above the roar of the engine, I was beginning to feel like I was getting to know a bit more about her. She seemed to enjoy telling me all this stuff a bit too much - I had a feeling she was a bit of a gossip.

"They'll both be at the bonfire tonight. As will the nurses. There's three of us. One per doctor. You have no idea how glad we are to have another set of hands out here. We could hardly believe it when we got your application."

"I'm glad I got accepted," I replied honestly, "I've always been interested in rural medicine."

"Well, Keyes is about as rural as you can get," she turned from the road to smile at me.

Ruth continued to babble to me about life in Keyes, but my mind strayed elsewhere as I watched the scenery outside the window. It was beautiful out here. The land jutted out towards the ocean where it suddenly ended, falling off as cliffs. The sun was setting over the Indian Ocean, the sky a blazing red, matching the colour of the soil around us. Plants were sparse, mostly intermittent scrub. As we drove into Keyes, I instantly fell in love with it. On the outskirts of town was the mining settlement, mostly a caravan town made up of small trailers covered in air conditioners. Next to it were the houses for the miners with families, generic little houses, all matching in street after street. The other houses in Keyes were a lot more casual affair, mostly fibro, but occasionally there was an old stone cottage. In the town centre, the buildings were mostly old and made of stone. There was the town hall, a bank, the police station, a grocery shop and of course, the pub. A few streets back there was the hospital, in a style that was more befitting an earlier decade. I think you would describe it as utilitarian, but I didn't mind - I loved it.

We drove to just behind the hospital and pulled up in front of a small fibro house. It was painted an arsenic green.

"Welcome home," Ruth smiled, and got out of the car to help me with my things, "Just remember, don't put any holes in the walls."

I smiled. I had guessed as much.

Ruth helped me bring my bags inside the house and gave me a brief tour. The kitchen was small and seemed to be original, as did the bathroom, but I did like the look of the ducted air conditioning. It wasn't too hot at the moment, but then again, it was night. I'd hate to think of what this place would be like in the day, seeming shade seemed to be a myth around here. I didn't get too much of a chance to get settled in to my new home, as Ruth seemed determined to take me to my "Welcome to Keyes" barbeque. She dragged me back to her Land Rover and drove me to the footy oval, which appeared to be the only green thing in town.

Other four-wheel drives were parked in a loose circle, their boots open and music playing. People were wandering around, chatting to each other and laughing. It felt so welcoming.

As soon as we got out of the car, someone shouted, "Hey! It's Ruth and the new girl!"

Suddenly I was surrounded by admirers, all welcoming me and introducing themselves. I was fairly sure I wouldn't remember any names, and I hoped they would get repeated when I met them in the future.

There was only one face that stuck, and that was the only person not desperate to get to know me. He was sitting by the bonfire, and was pale with chocolate brown hair. I didn't know if it was the play of light, but his skin seemed to glisten with the flames, and his eyes appeared to be pitch black. He wasn't looking at me, but he did appear to be listening to something. A small smile crept across his face.

"Hey, Oliver! Aren't you going to come meet the new girl?"

He turned and smiled at the questioner, who turned out to be Doug, the local cop.

"I thought maybe she would like to be buried alive under one less body. I _am_ going to see her at work, you know."

His voice was beautiful, with a gentle English accent. So this was Dr Monroe. No wonder Ruth had let the conversation drift to him, again and again. He was the most beautiful man I had ever seen, even when compared to Mark.

"Yeah, but tonight's her night, Oliver. After this, she's going to be too buried with _work_ to enjoy herself. Join the party."

"How about you come help me with these sausages, Doug. I seem to remember something about this being a barbeque. I'm sure you'd like to get fed at some point."

With that, Doug said his goodbyes and went to help the remarkably handsome doctor. Other people came in his place to chat to me, but my mind was distracted. Throughout the evening, my mind strayed to Oliver Monroe again and again, and I couldn't help but wish that he would come over and annoy me.

Eventually, after everyone was fed, the night started to wind down. People were now sitting in the boots of their 4x4s, in portable deck chairs or on rugs surrounding the bonfire. I was sitting on a rug close to the fire, my arms wrapped around my knees, and I was falling asleep. Every now and then, my eyes would glance over towards Dr Monroe, and he was always in conversation with one person or another. He appeared to be very popular (honestly, with a face like that, how could he not be?). But I wasn't worries that he didn't like me. Apart from not talking to me all evening, which I put down to him trying to be a gentleman, his eyes did seem to glance at me every now and then, as if questioning. Although I doubted it, I did hope that he was as anxious to meet me as I was to meet him.

Suddenly the wind blew from behind me, throwing a shower of sparks towards Dr Monroe, and his head snapped up to look at me. Bore into me, more accurately. I had never seen _anyone_ in my life look like that before, and my blood went cold. He looked so fierce, so angry, and he was looking at me. His easy going manner had left him, his body had gone rigid.

He held my stare for a few seconds, then was suddenly up on his feet in a movement so graceful I wasn't sure I hadn't imagined it. The next thing I knew, he had left.

What had just happened? More importantly, what had I done?

Suddenly I wasn't so sure he wanted to meet me anymore.


	2. Chapter 2

After the first chapter Im not sure if any one is reading this, so please review or PM me to let me know if I should keep posting.

thank you

J.

2. Enigma

I must admit, even though life in Keyes was very different to anything I had experienced before, I didn't have any trouble settling in. Dr Young (who insisted I call him Greg, but I was too used to working in the big hospitals to manage that just yet) gave me a tour around the hospital the next morning, and gave me my work roster.

Dr Young was a jolly old man. He reminded me of Santa Clause for some reason, just without the beard. His face was round and balding, and he wore these Harry Potter-esque glasses, always set halfway down his nose. And he was always smiling.

My work roster was quite busy, but I was happy with that. I wasn't sure what sort of past times Keyes offered, and seeming I tended to get bored easily, busy was good.

Monday and Tuesday I had clinic in the hospital from 8am till 5pm, with a one hour lunch break at 1pm. Wednesday I had outreach clinics at any one of the four Aboriginal communities around Keyes. Thursday I had clinics again, and Friday I had after hours on call at the hospital. Every second weekend I was to be on call as well.

Pretty much I would be spending all my time with Dr Young, as his timetable mirrored mine, except for Friday night on call. This was because Dr Young would be my supervisor for this year, because as an intern, I still needed someone to sign off all the work I do to make sure I didn't make a mistake.

Dr Monroe I would hardly see. He was always on night shift, so pretty much the only time I would be inflicted upon him was my Friday night on call.

I had to admit, I was a little disappointed, but then again, after Dr Monroe's exit at the barbeque, maybe it was good that I didn't have to inflict myself upon him.

The week went by smoothly. Dr Young was a great teacher, and I did get to do 99% of the work myself. In fact, quite often when I brought him a chart to check off on, he would sign without really looking at it. Whether this was because he trusted me or if it was because he was too busy to do otherwise, I didn't know. But I was fairly sure if he didn't trust my judgement, he would have checked more thoroughly.

Ruth really did fall into a motherly role with me. During working hours, she always said hi and asked how I was doing, and every night after work she would ask me over to her place for dinner, where she would regale me with stories about her life in Keyes. She lived with her son Darcy, who was nearly 16, but the only time I ever saw him was as soon as dinner was put down on the table, and he left as soon as it was finished. Ruth would always sigh and say he was going through a phase. I guess Keyes had more of a social scene than I thought.

I had the day off on Friday to prepare me for my night shift. I really didn't know what to do with myself, apart from sleep, but I thought that it would be best if I left that for the afternoon. So that morning I decided to go for a walk around town, something I hadn't really had a chance to do before now. So I slathered myself with sunscreen (my skin was too pale not to - I didn't tan, I burned), threw my unruly curls into a loose ponytail and put on a hat and sunglasses. I took slip-slop-slap very seriously.

Town was so small it didn't take me a long time to walk through it all. In fact, I managed to loop through it three times in an hour. I did stop in at the grocery shop to pick up some things for dinner, and some extra for Saturday when I would ask Ruth if she'd like to come over for dinner. I felt guilty being cooked for all the time. After I brought my groceries home and put them away, I decided that I wanted to go look at the ocean, so I revved up the old Land Cruiser I was provided with, and drove the five minutes to the cliffs.

When I got there, I was in awe with the beauty of it as I was on my first day, even now when the spectacular sunset was replaced with the vivid blue sky. You could look out across the ocean endlessly, and the way the cliffs dropped away made this feel like the edge of the world. It was beautiful.

I set up an old picnic blanket next to my car, and an old umbrella over that, and sat myself down to watch the world pass me by. I sighed, and after an hour or so, packed myself up and drove myself home. I would need to sleep if I was going to stay awake all night. From what I had heard, Friday nights in Keyes were never boring.

So it was at 6pm when I dragged myself over to Keyes Hospital to start my first night shift. The sun was setting, casting a red glow over everything, making the earth look like it was on fire. I didn't see Dr Monroe when I got in, so I asked Cassie, the nurse on call for the evening, if he was in yet. She told me he was, but even with that information I didn't manage to find him.

The first trauma for the evening came in around 7pm. A man had gotten into a fist fight with a tree (in other words, someone had beaten him up and he said that he had walked into a tree. A difficult concept when Keyes didn't have any trees over 4 feet tall). I went about cleaning the wound and stitching him up, knowing full well that I _needed_ Dr Monroe to check him off before I was allowed to discharge him. I asked Cassie to find him when I was putting in the final suture. Next thing I knew, he was there.

He was even more beautiful under the buzzing fluorescent lights, they somehow made his skin even more translucent that I felt brown next to him. He had brushed his chocolate hair away from his eyes, which I could see today were a golden brown (how I ever thought he could have had black eyes like some kind of monster was beyond me), and the way his button-down short sleeve shirt pulled across his chest suggested that he was very toned beneath it.

Dr Monroe only examined my stitching for the barest of moments, so short I didn't even notice him take a breath, before he nodded at me, signed my chart and disappeared again.

I felt my heart sink. At the bonfire, Dr Monroe had chatted merrily to anyone that came near him - apart from me. Even now, while we were working together, he couldn't bring himself to say one word to me, to even be around me. What had I done wrong?

The rest of the night followed pretty much the same pattern. Someone came in, normally with an alcohol-related injury or illness (I had managed to dodge being vomited on three times already), I would fix them up as best I could, ask Cassie to find Dr Monroe for me, he would appear, sign my chart, and leave, normally without acknowledging me in the slightest. Occasionally, if he thought I'd missed something, he might spit out a word like "LFTs" before he disappeared, but not once did I get to see the smile he greeted other people with at the bonfire, to hear the flow of his English brogue, or get any insight at all into what kind of doctor he was. He always seemed painfully rigid around me.

I asked Cassie during our tea-break if he was okay. She looked at me, confused. He seemed as lovely as ever to her. I just sighed. So it was just me he gave the cold shoulder to.

Around midnight, the call came in that there was a car rollover just outside of town, three people were injured. Seeming there was no ambulance in Keyes, we would have to go out to it. My heart started beating more rapidly - my first road trauma. I thought we would travel there in the same car, but just before Dr Monroe got into his Range Rover, he spun to face me. We had never been this close to one another, and I could feel my breath hitch in my chest.

"Dr Snow, we will need more than one car to bring the casualties back."

Oh, so I was being ditched. Ok.

I don't know why this stung me like it did. It made sense that with three casualties, we would need more than one car to bring them back. It's not like we could squish them in like sardines, but still, it _felt_ like it was an excuse to not be near me.

So I drove over to the crash site. I couldn't work out how they managed to roll the car here, the dirt road was perfectly straight, one of the better roads outside of Keyes. But there it was, the ute upturned on it's roof. I could see the local SES surrounding the vehicle, using the jaws of life to free the two moaning passengers inside. Dr Monroe was already looking after the man who was in the tray when the car rolled. He looked pretty bad, he was so pale that even Dr Monroe looked like he had colour. A SES worker was squeezing a bag of saline as Dr Monroe worked like a machine, trying to reduce the blood loss. He had removed his shirt to make a makeshift tourniquet, and there was blood splashed across his chest, like rubies scattered amongst diamonds.

I heard the screech of metal tearing, as finally another passenger was freed from the wreckage. Two SES guys pulled him out and dragged him over to me. He was yelling and holding his leg, where a metal bar was pierced through it. Did we have any tourniquets? I didn't want to remove my shirt like Dr Monroe did to stop the bleeding…

"In the bag," Dr Monroe shouted over the din.

I looked at the emergency bag that had suddenly appeared at my side (how did that get there?) and opened it up, finding a tourniquet in the side pocket (why had Dr Monroe ruined his shirt when a perfectly good tourniquet existed?), yanked it out a pulled it tight around the leg above where the metal bar was. My patient, a young man around my age, continued to shriek with pain, so I pulled morphine out of the bag and gave him an injection to calm him down. I inserted a drip in his arm, letting the saline replace the blood that was lost. I couldn't really do much else for him, I floundered, feeling useless.

This man needed a trauma centre, the nearest of which was in Broome, three hours away by light aircraft. If you considered the flight there and back, assuming they had already left, it would be six hours before he would be able to have his leg repaired. By then, it would be too late to save it.

"Move," Dr Monroe was by my side, still not meeting my eyes.

I moved to the side and allowed him to take my place by the leg.

"But your patient…"

"He's dead."

I looked over to where he came from, and saw the SES bloke who had been holding the bag of saline, pulling a sheet over what was his patient.

"Get me my bag from my car, Dr Snow."

I rushed over to his Range Rover, and yanked open the door, throwing myself into it, looking for his bag. I thought I found what I was looking for, and rushed back over.

In the short time I had been gone, the scene around my patient had changed. There was a blue tarp pulled underneath his leg, the red sand that caked the wound was being washed away as I looked at Dr Monroe, who had pulled on a pair of surgical gloves. As I placed the bag beside him, he motioned for me to do the same.

He worked without talking, incising the leg as my patient screamed in pain, dissecting around the pole as my patient was held down by three burly SES guys. Every now and then, his hand would flick out towards me, and I would place the instruments that I retrieved from his bag to him. I watched as he worked, completely at awe at how skilful his hands were, how calm he was in what could hardly be called a makeshift theatre. I was frozen as I watched him work to remove the metal pole. I don't think I could have moved if I wanted to.

"Dr Snow, some more morphine for your patient."

I shook my head clear. Of course - pain killers. I could hardly blame Dr Monroe for such a lapse in judgement, he had his hands full where he was. As I fumbled through the emergency bag to find something that would reduce the pain, I wished desperately for the anaesthetic tray at the hospital. What I wouldn't give to have something to knock him out with!

But I just had to make do with the morphine, there was no midazolam or anything else to put him to sleep with, which I inserted into his IV. I couldn't give him enough to stop his pain completely (it would probably also stop his breathing), but I could give him enough hopefully to make him more comfortable.

He worked for a few more minutes in silence, reaching out every now and then for me to hand him something else. The next thing I knew, he yanked the metal rod from the wound, as the patient shrieked in pain and I watched in horror, expecting blood to come spurting from the wound, which it didn't. He threw the rod aside, and started in on the wound again, sowing bits and pieces back together.

"You can go have a look at patient 3 now. I can manage from here," he grunted, sounding short of breath.

I hadn't noticed that his breathing should be laboured. In fact, it hadn't registered if he was breathing at all.

I stood myself up, careful that none of the dust I was caked with blew towards the wound, and walked over towards the final victim of this accident. He was in much better shape than the others - he had been the only one wearing a seatbelt, which was evidenced by the large purple bruises developing across his chest and stomach. He had a few small cuts and a broken arm, which I put in a backslab (the plaster would have to wait till we got back to the hospital to have it x-rayed), and I stitched the worst of his cuts under local anaesthetic.

My patient just sat there while I went to work, his eyes never leaving the covered shape that had been his friend. Tears rolled slowly down his cheeks, washing away the dirt caked to his face.

"It was just meant to be a bit of fun," he repeated to himself, over and over.

Although I could find it in my heart to feel sorry for this young man, at the same time I was starting to feel angry at his group. I had smelt the alcohol on the breath of the driver as I attempted to deal with his leg, just as I could smell it on my current patient. I could see now the tire tracks ground into the dirt road where he and his mates were trying to get the ute to do donuts. How could they have been so stupid? But my hands remained gentle as I pulled my needle back and forth through his skin. I don't think he needed my lecture to know they had done the wrong thing. The blue tarp pulled over his friend was more than enough evidence for that.

I looked out the window and could see the colour on the horizon start to change. It had been two hours since the RFDS plane had come and collected the driver with his leg, although I couldn't see why he needed to go to Broome. Dr Monroe had re-established blood flow and his leg appeared to be almost as good as new - I had seen worse operation outcomes at the RAH, with their world class facilities, when compared to what Dr Monroe had managed to do at the side of a dirt road on a blue tarp.

Dr Monroe had gone back to his no-talking policy as soon as our patient had been flown out. He did watch me, however, x-ray and plaster the passenger's arm, signing off my chart so he could be admitted for observation overnight. He did say one last thing to me, as he signed the chart:

"Revise your primary survey for next time. Remember: airways, breathing, circulation. You… did well… for a first timer."

I sighed and wondered if the enigma of Dr Monroe's dislike for me would ever be revealed as I packed up my stuff and readied myself to go home. I didn't even bother to search out Dr Monroe to say goodbye - inevitably he would currently be behaving like a ghost, as he always did as I looked for him. What a strange, intriguing man. I was too tired to ponder his disposition anymore, collapsing on my couch as soon as I walked through the

door, not having enough energy to carry myself to my bed.

That was the first time I dreamt of Dr Monroe.

I was standing in the centre of a dirt road that could have been anywhere, stretching off in a straight line as far as the eye could see, the horizon on all sides of me unbroken, not even by a single piece of scrub. I was watching the horizon for something, something I knew I couldn't see. I could feel the wind swirling around me, making the white dress I was for some reason wearing (I hated dresses), swirl around me like I was Marilyn Monroe. My blonde ringlets blew in the wind (why was my hair down?). Suddenly, he was in front of me, his chest bare except splattered with what I knew to be blood. Rubies and diamonds. His eyes were dark and dangerous, black, like the night at the bonfire. His hair did not blow in the wind, it had ceased as abruptly as his arrival.

He just stared at me, not breathing. I felt like touching his chest, whether to feel the toned muscles that rippled before me, or to see if my clinical assumption about his breathing was accurate. But I just stood there, staring back at him.

"What are you doing here, Kaia, it's not safe." his gorgeous accent made me melt.

"How could I not be here when that is where you are?"

"Because it's where I am is the exact reason why you should not."

What a confusing conversation! Who talked like this in real life? I must be dreaming.

I reached out my hand towards him, desperate to touch his skin.

He took a step back and sighed.

"Even the most beautiful flowers have thorns."

And then he disappeared.

I awoke abruptly, the sun shining in through my window. I was sprawled across my bed (how did I get here?), my sheets strewn across my floor. I had evidently discarded them at some point, the weather hot enough that they would only hinder my comfort.

I groaned - I had never been a morning person - and rolled over to look at my clock. It was already past lunch time. I was amazed I wasn't hungry. I sat up and saw myself in the mirror, my mess of golden ringlets strewn around my head, evidently having come out of the ponytail I had held them in last night. My clothes were smeared with dirt and blood. They would need a good soak…as would my bedding, as I had slept there in this mess all night.

After I put my laundry on, I had a shower, then sat down to eat my breakfast, hoping that it would be the final key to making me feel human again. As I stared grumpily at my Weet-bix, I pondered my dream. Why was I dreaming about Oliver Monroe? And why was it so cryptic? Was I attracted to him because of his undeniable beauty, or was it because I was intrigued by his behaviour around me? I couldn't see why his dislike of me bothered me so much. Plenty of people disliked me - they were always jealous how everything seemed to come easy to me. But Oliver (somehow my dream had changed him from Dr Monroe to Oliver in my mind) was easily _as_ smart as me, probably even smarter. His skill as a surgeon last night was more than evidence to that. He had

no reason to feel jealous of me, I was in awe of _him_.

Maybe it was my obvious awe of him that was putting him off. I had thought I had managed to compose myself around him, but maybe he was exceptionally observant. Maybe he had seen that I was developing a crush on him, and, trying to be a gentleman, he was establishing space between us so my infatuation would not develop further. But was I developing a crush on Oliver? I didn't think so. Even though he was (without understating things) the most beautiful man I had ever seen, obviously the most intelligent and had a great accent (I was a sucker for accents), I didn't think that I thought of him in anyway other than a colleague. I mean, the man annoyed me sometimes with his aloofness that he seemed to reserve solely for me. But then again, I _was_ dreaming about him, but was anything in that dream sexually charged? All I remembered was how confusing it was. Flowers with thorns?

Perhaps that was the reason I dreamed about him. I was confused about Oliver Monroe. I had never liked not understanding something, so maybe the dream was just my subconscious trying to work things out. If that was the case, it had failed miserably. I was even more confused now then I was before.

Once I washed up my dishes and put my clothes and sheets in the dryer (you couldn't hang things on the line out here or they would end up messier than before), I went over to Ruth's house. I was hoping she could distract me from my dream - Ruth was always good for gossip.

I guess that was one of the good things about small towns - doors were always open, so I entered her house without knocking. It was too hot to stay outside for long - I would end up looking like a lobster.

"Kaia!" She greeted me warmly, walking up to hug me, as was becoming standard for us, "I can't believe you're out of bed already! From what I heard you had a busy first night."

"Oh, it wasn't too bad. Oliver got stuck with the hardest work. I just got to sit beside him and hand him things mostly."

"That's not what I heard from Oliver, he said you had a natural talent for these things…" I lost concentration in her rambling discussion about the miner boys who were involved in the accident, distracted by what she had said. Oliver Monroe had _complimented_ me? Without prompting?

"Wait, when did you speak to Oliver?"

"Oh, he rang me up shortly after your shift ended. He wanted me to come and check on you later today. Thought you'd be exhausted and sleep for the next week."

So he was not only complimenting me but looking after my wellbeing? What was with this man?

"I should have told him not to worry. I mean, look at you, you're awake before Darcy is and he doesn't have the excuse of being up all night at a road accident. That was pretty bad luck scoring that one on your first night shift, but then again, it was lucky for Oliver you were on. I'm not sure he would have managed as well on his own…"

I zoned out Ruth's rambling again, deep in thought. Did this mean Oliver didn't hate me, as I always felt whilst he was around? So why did he avoid me? These thoughts frustrated me - I was here to be distracted and I was failing miserably.

"Ruth, why is Oliver out here anyway? I mean, he's a brilliant surgeon, shouldn't he be working in a larger hospital?"

"Oh. I guess he's a bit like you. You know, a child prodigy. Trained at Oxford over in England, graduated when he was eighteen, trained as a surgeon in London. Next thing I know, two years ago I get a letter from this 21 year old boy asking if he could come work out here. I was floored by his qualifications. I thought it was a hoax, so I went to talk to Greg about it. He was a little confused about why he would want to come out to here from England of all places, wondered if he'd be able to settle in, but Greg was right, if it was real, we would have been mad to pass up such skills. Next thing I knew Oliver rocked up here and settled into life in Keyes like he had always been here. He doesn't have a contract, he works on the Medicare rebate alone. Bulk bills all his patients too. Tells me he doesn't need to worry about money, that he was left heaps of it by his parents. Says he enjoys helping the community out here too much to leave."

My mind was floored. Oliver was only 23 and he was that talented? Mark was 23...he would be so envious of Oliver he probably would turn green. And he just randomly decided to come out here from England? But why? And he studied at Oxford…none of this made sense why thing boy genius would decide to leave being a surgeon in London to work the night shift in Keyes, Western Australia. Who was this man?

Review and let me know your reading. J.


	3. Chapter 3

3. The Accident

My life after that fell into the same strange pattern. Even though I was worked off my feet all week, I always looked forward to Friday nights, wondering how much more of the enigma that was Oliver Monroe I could figure out that evening. He still never talked to me more than a few words, and unless it was necessary to be around me, he always was invisible while I was around. I would always fall asleep on my couch after night shift, and would always wake up in my bed the next morning. On Saturdays I would go over to Ruth's, with my satellite phone strapped to me if I was on call that weekend, and we would discuss the phone call she always had with Oliver that morning about me. Not that he ever revealed that much to her - he thought I was very talented and wanted to make sure I woke up sometime during the next week. Did he really think I was so weak that working through one night would mean I'd feel the need to sleep forever? It wasn't like I was Snow White with the poison apple!

It was six weeks since I first arrived in Keyes, and I was glad for my little routine. I never felt any closer to understanding Oliver, but this only served to increase my interest in the man. I am rather embarrassed to admit I Googled him at one point, but nothing that was related to him ever popped up. His name seemed to be constantly popular throughout time, with people with his name existing as far back as the 1600s.

It was Friday afternoon again, and I was buzzing with the anticipation of our next meeting. What would he tell me tonight, or more importantly, what would he tell Ruth in the morning? I was a little impatient, sitting at home, waiting for 6pm to role around so I could head over to the hospital. I decided to go for a walk to distract myself for the hour that remained before I would have to go to work. I didn't walk anywhere in particular, my legs just carried me along as my thoughts were completely preoccupied with Oliver, yet again. I don't know what it was about him, but there was a sense of something entirely _other_ about him. I found it difficult to resolve the image I held of him in my head as merely human, something I knew that if I discussed with anyone else they would probably think I was mad.

In the intervening six weeks, there had been more than enough emergencies to keep us occupied during the Friday night shift. Like the time a pregnant Warrengibie woman came in complaining of stomach cramps, and Oliver instantly knew she had a placental abruption, even though she wasn't bleeding, and delivered her baby via an emergency caesarean section, saving both mother and child. Or the man who had been stabbed by a mate at the pub, who conveniently passed out while Oliver sewed up his wound seeming I couldn't administer anaesthetic at that time because I was preoccupied with the man who had stabbed him. That seemed to happen a lot around Oliver, patients conveniently passing out. I wished I was so lucky. Would save me from some of the verbal diarrhoea I had to put up with when yet another drunk was dragged up to hospital by either their mates or by Doug the cop.

Oliver also had a knack of knowing exactly what was going on without patients ever needing to say a word. It was like he could hear their thoughts or something, which was ridiculous, of course. He must just be fairly intuitive.

I just couldn't make what I observed in those brief moments I was around Oliver add up in my head. They always seemed to me like Oliver was something more. And this just served to make me even more interested in him. It was pathetic, I was starting to feel like a stalker.

I looked at my watch and it was time I head back to the hospital so I wouldn't be late for night shift. Knowing the brevity of our contact during these evenings just made it all the more important for me to be around in case he would be forced to be around me too.

I was nearly at the hospital when I looked down the road to see Oliver coming in the opposite direction. As always, he was wearing that trench coat of his and hat that he always wore during the day (he took slip-slop-slap even more seriously than I did - not surprising considering his skin), and as always, the sight of him distracted me from everything else, until there was a screeching sound coming around the corner. His eyes flew up in my direction, locked on my face in horror, and for once they didn't hold me as I turned to face the sound.

A car was barrelling around the corner, coming straight at me. I knew in that instant that I was going to die - I couldn't get out of it's way fast enough. It wasn't even a second later that I felt the impact, and I was surprised when I was thrown away into the wall of the hospital, hearing my arm snap.

I looked back to where I was and saw the car wrapping around Oliver, somehow in the space I had been a second ago. I screamed, whether due to my arm or the terror of seeing the death of someone I knew, I couldn't say.

The car flipped over Oliver, as if somehow he had acted as a fulcrum, once again flying in my direction. I didn't feel fear this time as it came towards me, a sense of inevitability washed over me. This was it, I was dead.

But it didn't hit me. I waited, braced, with my eyes shut, but that impact never came. I opened my eyes and saw the ute on it's side, barely three meters from where I lay. How had it ended up there? I didn't want to look at it too closely, knowing that it would be smeared with Oliver's remains. I closed my eyes again and tried to keep breathing.

"Kaia? Kaia? Are you alright?"

I opened my disbelieving eyes, and there he was. In one piece, not a scratch on him, standing before me in a pale blue shirt, his golden eyes filled with worry.

"Kaia, can you hear me?"

"Where's your trench coat?" I couldn't believe that was the first garbled sentence out of my mouth - it should have been, _why are you alive?_ I guessed I wasn't sure that he _was_ alive. Maybe I was hallucinating.

"I didn't bring my trench coat today. Kaia, are you hurt?"

No, he had brought his trench coat. I saw him in it just before… why was this so important?

He reached towards me and touched my forehead, evidently deciding I was beyond rational conversation at the moment. I shivered as his cold hand brushed against my skin. Was he always this cold? Was he even here? Was I even here? No - the pain in my arm told me that I was alive at the very least. Whether he was or not, I was not entirely certain.

He reach across and touched my arm as I hissed in pain. His perfect brow furrowed in response.

"Kaia's arm's broken. Can you warm up the x-ray machine?"

Who was he talking to? Oh, Cassie had come out from the hospital, evidently the noise had alerted her.

"Can you call Greg? I'm not sure of the condition of those idiots in the car."

"Did she get hit?" Cassie sounded worried.

"Just clipped, I think. Thankfully they ran into the fire hydrant."

What? Fire hydrant? I had been nowhere near it, I was at least 5 meters away from that.

I looked up at him once again, trying to make my scrambled thoughts into coherent sentences.

"How you get here so fast?"

"I was only a few metres away, Kaia. I pulled you out of the way."

So I hadn't been hit by the car - Oliver had pulled me away. _Thrown_ me away, if my flight into the wall was anything to go by. How strong was this man? Strong enough to survive being hit by a ute, anyway.

"You…were hit. You should be dead. Why aren't you dead?"

"I wasn't hit, Kaia, the car was nowhere near me."

"Yes, I saw you, I saw you die…"

"You're in shock, Kaia, you're just imagining things."

"I'm not!"

"It all happened so quickly, how can you be sure of what you saw?"

"If it didn't happen, then where's your trench coat?" As the words spilled out, it suddenly clicked. _He_ may be pristine, but he was missing his trench coat. Evidently getting rid of the evidence…wait, had I gone mad?

"Please, Kaia," he begged me, as Doug the cop arrived finally.

I don't know why, but I swallowed and nodded at him. These questions could always wait for later, when we were alone.

Oliver stood up and left me then, going to greet Doug and tell him what happened, and then go and see to, as Oliver called them, those idiots in the car. Dr Young reached me then, babbling about if I was ok and did my arm hurt and all sorts of things that I wasn't really listening to. My mind was somewhere else.

After my x-rays, it was decided that I would need to be flown to Broome and get my arm reconstructed by an orthopaedic surgeon. I had fractured my humerus in two places, most of it shattered into pieces. Dr Young couldn't work out how it had shattered in that way - the area was about the size of a human hand… I would need a shoulder reconstruction, as my arm had dislocated in the process (something else Dr Young couldn't explain) and I had fractured the joint capsule. I had an idea of how that had happened though…

I hadn't seen Oliver again since the accident, but my mind hadn't left the scene. I just kept playing it over and over in my head.

I was walking down the street, Oliver was walking towards me about a hundred metres away, the ute came rushing around the corner and was going to hit me, suddenly I was thrown away from it's path and into the wall, breaking my arm, then Oliver was hit by the car, the car flipped _over_ him and should of landed on me, but instead landed three metres away from me. Somehow in all of that, Oliver had lost his trench coat.

I must be going mad.

The two men in the ute - drunk, of course - could hardly remember the incident. Neither of them could remember Oliver being anywhere near them. Then again, they couldn't remember _me_ being anywhere near them, so they were hardly reliable witnesses. Unbelievably, they both came out of it fairly unscathed. The same thing could not be said for their ute.

Ruth had been fluttering around me like a mother chook since the accident. I couldn't get any sense out of her, so I didn't try. Evidently she needed to babble to calm herself down. I had calmed down considerably since the accident, even though my mind continued to whirr as piece by piece fell into place in my head. Once I was done working out what had happened, Oliver and I _were_ going to have a talk. Even if I could make sense of the how, only he could make sense of the why.

The RFDS plane arrived and I was being shuffled out towards it, Oliver still not having reappeared. This frustrated me - I would not get the chance to talk to him before I left, and I had no idea when I would be able to come back. Was this his plan? Did he think if I was away long enough I would forget about my impossible rescue? He was not going to be that lucky.

When we got to the airstrip, I saw a man come bounding over to us. Was he a local? He was indigenous, though I couldn't say if he was Warrengibie or not, but he was lighter than most of our locals. One of his parents was white, obviously. He had a mop of curls and a cheeky smile, and he was well dressed in a simple white dress shirt, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and a pair of old jeans. A stethescope hung around his neck.

"Hi, I'm Dale. You must be my patient for today."

I couldn't help but smile back at him. His personality permeated the air around him.

"I'm Kaia."

"Lovely to meet you, Kaia. So, business class or economy?"

"Don't think I can afford business class."

"It's alright, I know a guy," and he winked at me and turned to Dr Young.

"Multiple fractures to left middle and distal humerus. There is splintering of the bone distally. There is also a fracture of the glenoid capsule from a posterolateral dislocation, which has been reduced."

"Ok, so no-one else to pick up while I'm here?"

Dr Young shook his head, as Dale turned back to me.

"Ok, let's get this show on the road."


	4. Chapter 4

4. Liiver Man

The three hour flight to Broome could have been boring, but Dale was a very chatty person and his good temperament was infectious. After briefly asking me what had happened to my arm ("I was hit by a car"), he was more interested in how I was enjoying life in Keyes.

"You seem to know a lot about Keyes," I said, once he asked me if the grocers still overcharged for everything.

"I should do," he laughed, "I was born there."

"Oh, so that would make you…"

"Warrengibie, yeah. Well, part, anyway."

"And now you're a doctor?"

"Yup, emergency registrar with the RFDS. Dream come true. How bout you? How'd you end up in Keyes?"

"I filled out an application and they accepted me as their intern," I shrugged - wrong move, it hurt.

He laughed, "Big mistake. Bet if you were at some city hospital you wouldn't be in this plane right now."

"If I was in some big city hospital I still wouldn't have gotten to touch a real patient yet," I retorted.

He laughed again, "Guess you're right. I think during my internship I only got to touch maybe three patients, and most of them had already been touched by at least six people before I got to them. So, you're pretty lucky then, being hit by a car and getting out of it with just a broken arm."

"I was lucky that I got pulled out of the way so I didn't get hurt too badly." I was trying to be truthful. Besides, I wasn't sure of exactly what the truth was… yet. I was hoping my hypotheses would get slightly more developed than Oliver-Monroe-must-be-Superman.

"Who pulled you out of the way? Must have been pretty brave," he seemed truly interested.

"Another doctor at the hospital."

"Not Dr Young!"

"No, Dr Monroe."

As soon as I said his name, the cheerful banter ceased and Dale froze. What did that mean? Before I could ask, a smile started creeping across his face again.

"Well I'll be. Dr Monroe. Didn't know he had it in him. No-one's going to believe that," he mumbled to himself.

"What?"

"Never mind, just the native being silly."

"What does Dr Monroe have to do with the Warrengibie?"

"Oh, it's nothing. It's just, there's some stories about Dr Monroe out in the communities," he shrugged, "Don't worry about it, it's just a myth."

"You know you're going to have to tell me now," I joked with him. I figured keeping things light was the best way to pull information from Dale.

"Nah, nah. Don't worry, it's not that good a story…"

"Please?"

He sighed, "Ok, but you're going to think I'm stupid. Just remember, it's just a story, ok?"

"Ok."

Dale resettled himself in his seat, still looking vaguely uncomfortable, but started with his story, anyway.

"The Warrengibie are a proud people, made from sand and time and raised with the spirits of the eagle. Because of our birth, we are wanderers, doomed to roam our land and protect it from evil spirits. But because of our wandering, many parts of our land we don't see for a long time, which, every now and then, lets evil to take root in our lands.

"We were absent from the edge of the world when Liiver Man arrived. A wanderer himself, he had walked across the entirety of existence, looking for the end of everything, and found it at the end of the world. And there he sat, watching as time went by, not aging. He had found peace in his solitude. For Liiver Man had a dark burden to carry. He was a cursed spirit, a soulless man. His soul had been stolen many years ago, long enough for the world to change and for many generations to have been born and rejoined the earth. When his soul had been stolen, this left Liiver Man with an emptiness, an emptiness that could only filled by drinking the souls of others. But Liiver Man was stronger than other men who had met this fate - and there are others who have, who's entire existences are consumed by trying to fill the void left by their soul with the souls of others. Liiver Man felt his emptiness, but could not bear to inflict what he had suffered upon others to fix it, so he became a wanderer, knowing that the only way to keep him from giving in to temptation was to avoid it altogether. He knew he was a cursed man, and welcomed the silence.

"Liiver Man remained there at the edge of the world, unaware that the land was protected by the Warrengibie. Here he hunted the kangaroo and the bunyip, trying to sate his thirst as much as he could by using the souls of animals, although he hated himself for doing so. It was while he was drinking from a bunyip that the Warrengibie returned to the edge of the world, where they saw Liiver Man.

"We had been gone from our lands for too long and evil had taken root here. We knew that we had to cleanse our land, to destroy Liiver Man to make it safe again, but how do you destroy a soulless man?

"Liiver Man saw us, and dropped his prey. He was as white as clouds, and glistened in the moonlight. His golden eyes were a warning. He walked towards us, speaking in a tongue we did not understand, but my ancestors stood their ground. Suddenly, he started to speak in our tongue, his face contorting as he tried to force the sound out.

"He told the Warrengibie that he meant us no harm, that he came here for some peace, and that he would not hurt us. He only wished that he would grant him some space here so he could think. We knew that if we engaged him, even though we shared our blood with the eagle, we would be defeated. So we granted Liiver Man his land at the edge of the world, with the promise in return that he would not cross into our land.

"And there he has stayed, for generations beyond counting. He leaves for a time, but he always returns to the end of the world. And he has kept his promise with the Warrengibie, never setting foot on our land in over two hundred years."

I listened, mesmorised. During his story telling, Dale had become another man, speaking with the power of ages. I was a little in awe. Still, I had no idea what his story meant. What did this have to do with Oliver? We sat in silence as I thought the story through in my head as Dale watched me apprehensively. Slowly, the pieces started to fit together. White skinned. Golden eyed. Undefeatable…which could be taken to mean _indestructible_… wait…

"You think Dr Monroe is a soul drinker?"

"No…"

"Oh, good…"

"…he's Liiver Man."

My world spun. Oliver. Liiver Man. _Liiver_ Man. O-_liiver_.

Oh. My. God.

As soon as I made the connection, I knew it was true. Oliver was Liiver Man. A soulless man. An immortal. No wonder he didn't do the out reach clinics in the Warrengibie communities. He _wasn't allowed_.

"…it's just a story, Kaia. You know, bunch of superstitious natives. _I_ don't think he's a vampire…"

My eyes snapped to him, "What do you mean a vampire?"

"Well, you know, he drinks souls. _Not Oliver I mean Liiver Man_. I mean, what else is there to drink besides blood in a body."

Oliver always worked the night shift. Oliver _never_ was out while it was daylight. Oliver wore his trench coat on his way to work. It was never about slip-slop-slap…

I had to stop thinking about it. Something about my facial expression was horrifying Dale.

I forced a smile to my face, "That was a good story, have you got any more?"

I was glad that Dale felt the need to regale me with more stories about the Dreaming, otherwise it would have been impossible to try and keep this new information out of my head, that Oliver was a vampire.

Ok, I probably had gone mad, but what else made sense?

As soon as I got to Broome I was wheeled in to surgery, so I didn't have a chance to think about that for a long time. When I woke up, my arm was in a thick cast, and I felt groggy, but I was capable of thinking.

_If_ Oliver was Liiver Man (I refused to think vampire any more, that wasn't in the Warrengibie story, just Dale's supposition), then that would make him hundreds of years old. No-one could be part of this world for that long without leaving some trace behind. I remembered when I had Googled Oliver, and all those people throughout time with the same name came up… could some of them be him?

Thankfully I was in a private hospital, so I was able to get internet access (which I would probably have to pay for later). I went to Google and typed in "Oliver Monroe". Three million, six hundred and fifty thousand hits. Hmm. This may be more difficult than I hoped for. I switched to the images page. I wasn't sure if there _could_ be images of Oliver - because wouldn't vampires be invisible to cameras? - but I figured it was my best hope of getting anything definitive. So I scanned through pages and pages, finding nothing. I sighed. It was too much to hope for, for this to be easy. But then, on the third page of images, I found one. He was standing next to a short man with an afro and glasses, in a crowd of hippies, looking much too clean cut to belong with them, while they were waving anti-Vietnam war placards. I opened the page this photo belonged to, and there it was. It was an online journal about some guy names Robert Hall. The caption below the photo read: "Me and Oliver Monroe. Anti-war Protest. Sydney University. 1973"

1973. And he looked exactly the same. His hair still had that windswept look, he still had those golden eyes.

But 1973 was over thirty years ago. This was promising.

I went back to the images page, now I knew that I had something to look for, and copy and pasted results into a Word document I could print later. When I had exhausted the image search, I went back to the web pages, now I had _some_ idea of where-he-was-at-what-time, I could filter my search to make things easier.

I found his photo from when he was in the First World War, found his army transcripts from when he was a medic for the Aussies at Gallipoli. I found out he received a purple heart in World War II, something he had "died" while doing. I found the ship log from the first fleet, which said he was a convict at the time for "the unnatural slaying of a sheep". The further back I got, the harder it was to know if the Oliver Monroes I was finding were him or not. I tried to match what details I knew, like his birthday (had weaselled that one from Ruth weeks ago), hoping that he had decided to keep the same date. Not that it was exactly original - January 1st. But, if all I found was accurate, it seemed like Oliver _had_ existed since the 1600s. I wasn't willing to bet on any earlier than the 1670s, though. Anything before then was a bit too sketchy to trust.

I sat in my hospital bed, staring at the endless list of references I found regarding Oliver. Why hadn't anyone noticed before? It was so obvious, when you knew to look, to find this stuff. Oliver Monroe was not human. He was so much more than that.

I knew when I got back to Keyes I was going to talk to him. How could I not? I already felt like I was going to combust from the knowledge. Maybe this was why Oliver never allowed me to get too close. Did he realise I was smart enough to unravel his secret?

Or was there some other reason, an answer I hadn't come up with yet?

Regardless, Oliver and I were going to talk when I get back, though I doubted he was going to like it…

On Saturday, the week after my accident, I got a flight back to Keyes. My body was buzzing with anticipation. I was going to confront Oliver about what I had learnt. I was going to get the answers I needed. The pages of research I had collected weighed heavily in my bag. I was fairly sure if I confronted him with evidence, he wouldn't try to lie to me. Then again…he could easily kill me to cover it up…no, he wouldn't do that. The man saved my life, why would he kill me? And besides, Liiver Man wasn't meant to hurt humans.

Ruth came and picked me up from the airstrip, and hugged me gingerly, trying to avoid the large plaster that covered most of my left side. In the car trip back to my place, I asked her where Oliver lived.

"Why do you want to know?"

_Because I'm going to confront him about being a four hundred year old monster…_

"Because I want to say thankyou, for him saving my life."

Good enough answer as any.

"Oh, well I can give him a ring and see if he wants to come over…"

"No, I'd rather surprise him. I'm fairly sure he doesn't like praise."

A grin crossed her face, "That sounds like Oliver. Ok, how about we swing by his place now, then I'll drop you home."

"Well, I was sort of hoping it could be private…besides, I'm fairly sure Oliver would drive me home."

Ruth was a saint, she didn't even ask me why I would want our reunion to be private. Then again, the way she looked at me with one eyebrow raised, maybe she wasn't so saintly…

For God's sake, he's old enough to be my great, great, great, great…

I grinned at my inside joke.

We drove quite a ways out of Keyes, down a small dirt road up to a small stone cottage. I didn't see anyone or hear anything, but then again, Oliver always managed to be a ghost when he wanted. Besides, the sun was up…

Stop being stupid, Kaia.

I hopped out of the car and waved Ruth off. She would come over to visit around about dinner. I sighed as I saw the dust trail her car left disappear.

I walked hesitantly up to the door of the cottage, almost afraid to knock. What was I doing? Had I gone completely mad? But I didn't get the chance to knock, Oliver opening the door while my hand was raised.

"Kaia Snow. What brings you here?"

"Oh, um…" not so brave now, was I? "I just got back, and I thought…we better talk."

He looked at me and raised his eyebrow, before standing aside so I could enter.

His house was a mix of antiques and more modern pieces, but oddly enough, they all blended together and looked like they belonged. There was no TV, but there was a wall full of books. There was an antique clock on the mantel piece.

I'm not sure what I expected his home to look like, but it wasn't like this.

He lead me over to the lounge chair - one of his more modern pieces, white suede - and looked at me, waiting.

He sighed impatiently.

"What have you come here to say, Kaia."

I didn't know how to start. We sat there in silence, as the irritation began to show more and more on his face. I couldn't get my thoughts together, but finally, I managed to whisper, "I know what you are, Oliver."

He froze. With him this close to me, I knew for certain he wasn't breathing, but then again, when did he ever breathe around me?

"I don't know what you mean…"

"I know you're Liiver Man. I know you're a… a vampire."

Of all the ways I thought of this conversation going in the past week, I never thought it would have been as blunt as this. I always imagined somehow twisting the conversation so _he_ was the one telling _me_ his secrets… but how naive had that expectation been? He'd been keeping his secrets for four hundred years!

I wasn't sure he was ever going to talk again. He held as still as a statue.

"How did you find out?"

Good, he wasn't going to lie to me.

"I'm a genius, remember. I'm good at figuring things out." I didn't want to dump Dale in it.

He sighed.

"I guess you are at that."

More silence. This was driving me nuts. Why couldn't he just pour his heart - or whatever vampires had - out to me like I always dreamt of him doing?

"Are you frightened of me?"

"No," and in the moment I said that, I knew it was true. I didn't care what he was. So why had I pushed for the truth like I had? I felt awful.

"You should be scared of me."

"I don't think I can be scared of you."

"Why?"

"Because…I trust you…because…" my breath hitched in my throat as I realised what I was about to say…because I loved him.

This knowledge struck me harder than the wall a week ago. I felt my very knowledge of my being shatter, and rearrange itself, to fit Oliver into the heart of that construct. Suddenly so many things made sense…why Oliver avoided me, why I was always waking up in my bed when I fell asleep on my couch, why he always called Ruth on Saturdays to make sure I was alright, why he had saved my life…

Oliver…loved…me too.

"You know why I can't be scared of you, Oliver," I looked into his now coal-black eyes.

I watched the passion well up, smouldering in the darkness of his eyes, and suddenly, in a movement that was too fast for me to see, Oliver was kissing me.

My head spun. Time seemed to hold still. I had _never_ been kissed like this before. Maybe you had to live for four hundred years to be _able_ to kiss like this. I didn't care.

Too soon, Oliver pulled away, his jaw held tight. I wondered what was wrong, but I was unable to catch my breath to be able to ask. It was almost embarrassing how ragged my breathing was!

I reached my hand towards his cool face, but he pulled back.

"Give me a moment," he said through his gritted teeth, as he closed his eyes and held perfectly still.

I sat there, as he willed himself into composure, my breathing slowing down as he relaxed. When he opened his eyes, I reached out and put my hand on his - it was ice cold, and as hard as stone.

"That's pleasantly warm, you know," He said, mumbling to himself. He looked into my eyes, and I could see myself reflected in them.

"This is wrong, you know that Kaia," he said to me, not looking away. There was no lie in his eyes, "I shouldn't care for you like this. It's too dangerous."

"I don't care," God, I sounded like a petulant child!

"I know you know what I am, Kaia, but you don't know _who_ I am. You have no idea how much danger you're putting yourself in, just by being here. Being the object of my affections is not a good thing."

"Why?"

"Because I'll kill you."

My body didn't even freeze, my heart didn't even skip a beat, even though Oliver had just expressed a desire to end my life. This should of worried me, but it didn't.

He sighed, "I knew as soon as I saw you that you were different. You weren't like the other humans I surround myself with. But I didn't know how much you would…tempt me…in ways that aren't good for either of us.

"When the wind changed at the night of the bonfire, when I caught your scent…" his voice trailed off, his mind a million miles away (well, 7 weeks ago, at least), "it took everything in my power not to kill you then."

Tally stands at two admissions at wanting to kill me. Why am I not afraid?

"You must have thought me a monster. Which I am, but, I've been alive for a very long time. I managed to escape before I needed to kill you" …three… "but I knew, if it happened again, if it was just us alone, then I might not be able to control myself. So I avoided you at work. You shouldn't be around me, you were just too tempting.

"But something drew me towards you. Like I said, you're different from other people. I don't… hear… you like I do them. This intrigued me, so I started watching. From a distance, but I was always watching."

"What do you mean, you don't hear me like you do other people."

"I can hear thoughts, but I can't hear yours." he said dismissively, "I don't know why that is."

Oh. That explains why he always seemed to know what his patients were thinking.

"We don't all hear thoughts, in fact, I only know of two others that do and they both do it in very different ways to me…but that doesn't matter…"

He sighed again, "Anyway, the more I found out about you, the more I wanted to be near you, and the more I was near you, the more I felt…and I'm so sorry. I should have been more responsible. And now, here you are, having feelings for me too…" he looked down where my hand rested on his, "and now I don't know how to stop this."

Once again, silence filled the room. I didn't know what to say. I loved him, and I knew he loved me, but was this love enough to stop him from killing me?

"Has anything else like this happened to you before?" Please say no, my heart would break otherwise.

He shook his head, "Never."

"Do you want to… kill… me now?" I asked.

"No! No, I don't _want_ to kill you! I've never _wanted_ to kill you, it's just, sometimes I feel like I have to, or that I could, accidentally," he grabbed my hands, looking me fervently in the eyes.

I could see the pain in there, the pain this knowledge of how easily I could die caused him.

"It's ok, Oliver…"

"Ok? It's ok that I want to kill you? How is that ok?" He was angry, whether at me or himself, I didn't know.

"No, Oliver, it's ok how you feel about me, how you're confused. The whole…wanting to kill me thing… that's nothing. I know you can do the right thing about that," How easily could I discuss my own death!

He sighed, "I don't know what to do…"

"Easy, don't do anything. We don't need to do anything today. I just felt like I should let you know that I know who you are. It's going to make this," I waved my hand between us, "Whatever this is, a whole lot easier."

I stood up and walked back towards the door.

"Thankyou for saving my life, Oliver," and I meant that in more ways than one, "I'll see you at work."

"Wait, how are you going to get home?"

"Oh," I hadn't thought of that. It was still daytime outside, Oliver couldn't go out, "I'll walk."

"Don't be stupid you'll burn to a crisp. I'll drive you home." He got up and walked towards the door.

"I don't think I should wait another few hours before leaving, Oliver."

"Why would we need to wait?"

"Because it's daytime…"

For the first time this afternoon, a smile broke across his face, and he started laughing.

"Don't laugh at me!"

"I'm not, it's just…I _can_ go out into sunlight, Kaia. The whole burning to a crisp thing is just a myth," he kept chuckling.

"Then why do you only work nightshift?"

"Because I don't sleep and it seems nicer to everyone else who needs to…"

"Wait, you don't sleep?"

He shook his head, "Never."

"So that's the only reason you don't come out during day, cause you're being nice."

"Well, that and I'm a little bit obvious when I come out during the day…at least when it's sunny…"

"And what's that meant to mean?"

"Nothing."

I pouted - I hated not knowing something. He looked at my pouting bottom lip and sighed.

"Look, it's something I'll have to show you rather than tell you. If you don't realise overnight what a horrible monster I am, then maybe I'll show you on your day off or something."

"I'm not going to change my mind…"he put his finger up to my lips.

"Later. Let me drive you home."

**I hate to beg, but please review so I know you are out there.**

**K.**


	5. Chapter 5

5. Q&A

I had to admit, I was fairly poor company for Ruth at dinner that night. My mind was a million miles away. Ruth kept prodding me with questions, desperate for the gossip that she knew must have existed, but I was completely blissed out. It's amazing how being in love made you feel - at least once you knew you were, anyway.

Other people may point out that I had been in love before, with Mark, but now that I _was_ in love again, I wasn't entirely sure. Mark and I had a relationship of mutual convenience. It sounds horrible to distil it down to that, but I'm not sure I could describe it any other way. The more I thought about it, the more I wasn't sure how much of our three years together had been a lie, both him lying to me and me to myself.

I mean, Mark had always been what I held as an ideal partner. He was smart, directed, and he had a unfaltering sense of self. He never did anything unexpected (unless you count cheating on me as unexpected) and he always knew where he was headed, and how I fitted in to that life. I mean, I'm now a little worried that maybe the only reason we had lasted as long as we did had been because he fitted the image I held as "boyfriend material" in my head, that I overlooked his other flaws.

Mark had never been romantic, and he always seemed more interested in himself than he did me, unless what I did reflected badly on him. I wasn't really sure, but maybe the only reason he wanted _me_ was because I was the only one who did better than him. When we were seen as part of a whole rather than two competing individuals, it didn't matter which of us were better, because the success of one was the success of the other.

And Mark always had to win.

How I felt about Oliver, though, I couldn't even describe. I _felt_ him in every strand of my being, it was though we were two parts of the same person, I just hadn't realised it before. Maybe that explained why I was so drawn to him, because I was only complete while he was around.

God, I sound like a love-sick teenager!

I had only worked out how I felt about him this afternoon, and yet that knowledge was already an essential part of my being, I didn't know what I would do without it. And it terrified me, knowing how the fates were working to pull us apart - how could we be together if part of him wanted to kill me? Which part of Oliver would eventually win, the part that was in love with me, or the part that thirsted for me?

An even bigger, though more distant, problem also existed. Even if we could reconcile Oliver's Jekyll and Hyde, what would happen once a significant amount of time had begun to pass? I would get older, Oliver would not. Would my aging drag us apart? Would he feel less attracted to me as time went by? Would I feel less attracted to him? I couldn't see this love as being a passing fancy on my behalf, but Oliver? Would his love be as immortal as he was? I couldn't say. And if it was, what would happen to him when I did die? I could only imagine how I would feel if he ceased to exist - I would die from the grief.

Ruth finally admitted defeat on our conversation once she had finished eating, and said her goodbyes. I could only feel guilty for being such poor company, but a thousand thoughts occupied my mind. I would be glad for the solitude. I needed time to think.

The week past fairly quickly. I was disappointed that Oliver didn't come to visit me during that time. And I know he didn't - I deliberately fell asleep on the couch on Tuesday night (although that was very bad for my shoulder), to see if I would wake up in my bed. I woke up on the couch, so I spent the day grumpy, not only from my disappointment in my lack of night-time visitors, but also from my aching arm. I didn't make that mistake again.

I was so anxious to get to Friday, officially my first day back at work (Ruth tried to convince me to take Friday off, but I refused), that I spent most of the days sleeping, something that I had never done before. If anything, all the extra sleep just made me more grumpy.

I did pass some of the time researching vampires on the internet - I wanted to have some intelligent questions to ask Oliver when we did reunite. Even though I didn't care in the slightest _what_ Oliver was, I did realise that me reconciling and understanding _what_ he was with _who_ he was would probably be the only way Oliver would let this relationship to survive. I knew he would not allow me to put myself in danger without understanding what that danger was.

Friday afternoon finally rolled around, and I gave up and went to the hospital earlier than when my shift started, remembering what happened the last time I just wandered aimlessly through town to waste time.

I went and sat in the doctor's office in casualty, and prepared to wait for Oliver to arrive. I didn't have to wait long - pretty much as soon as I sat myself down in the swivel chair, he suddenly appeared.

"Hello Kaia, you're early," I had forgotten what strange things his accent did to me.

"Well, I was a bit bored. I've been stuck at home all week, and there hasn't exactly been a lot to do."

He grinned, "I guess you're right. I _am_ a little bit surprised to see you back at work so early, though."

"Why? Because of my shoulder, or did you think I had become sensible and decided to avoid you?" I teased.

"I had hoped so," evidently _that_ joke failed horribly.

"You know that's not going to happen. I've made up my mind, and it doesn't matter."

He sighed, "I shouldn't be glad that you're as stubborn as you are, but I am. I'm inherently a selfish creature."

I didn't know what words to say to brighten the mood.

"So, seeming it doesn't matter, I was wondering if you wanted to spend the day with me tomorrow."

"What, like a date?" I was a bit flummoxed, I didn't realise that normal courtship rules applied to vampires.

His smile lit up his face, "If that's what you want to think of it as, I just thought I could show you what I meant about sunlight, seeming you were so frustrated by my lack of explanation last Saturday."

"Oh," so not a date then, "Ok."

His smile grew just the slightest bit bigger - he was amused by my awkwardness.

"I'm not sure how much you're going to be able to do tonight with your arm in a plaster. I think maybe I'll triage the patients as they come in and allow you to deal with the patients that do not need to be touched."

So that basically reduced it to drunks that had passed out - other patients with sore throats and the like were sensible and waited till morning. How exciting.

"Maybe I could just watch you work tonight, see if I can pick up any techniques," like the ability to make patients pass out at will.

"Maybe. Just promise me - if anything comes in with too much blood flowing that you'll leave. I don't know how I'd react with that smell and your smell combined," his eyes seemed concerned.

I hadn't even thought of that, "How do you manage to be around blood anyway?"

His eyes flicked across the room, "Do you mind if questions like that could wait till tomorrow? Cassie _is_ around tonight, and I'm not as observant to her thoughts as I should be when you're around."

"Ok," sounded fair enough. As long as I _did_ get the answers I wanted, I was willing to wait till the morning.

So for the rest of the evening I followed Oliver around as much as I could, dutifully leaving the room for the one patient who was bleeding (he had been glassed in the face). I didn't realise that I had fallen asleep while I was waiting for him to finish sewing him up until I was woken by a knock on my door.

I was at home, in my bed. I could only smile when I realised how I had got there.

I opened my front door and there he was, basked in the glow of the sunrise. As always, he looked better in the morning than anyone had a right to - oh yeah, he didn't sleep.

"What time is it?" I rasped as I rubbed the sleep from my eyes.

"6am. I thought seeming you've been asleep since midnight and because we have a long way to travel to get to where I wanted to take you that an early start would be a good thing. Do you need more sleep? I'm sorry, I'm not very good at human needs…"

"No, no! I'm just not very good in the mornings. Give me a moment, I'll be ready in a second."

I ran to my room and tried desperately to change my clothes as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, this was slower than most people dressed - my cast was a hindrance. I quickly brushed my unruly hair and tied it into a ponytail, that stuck out behind my like a pom pom. I hated my hair.

Oliver held open the door to his Range Rover for me, and gently lifted me into it. I hadn't realised how tinted his windows were. Evidently, I was _not_ going to find out what he was like in the sun whilst in this car.

We drove for over an hour, not talking, as I watched the sun rise outside of the window. I couldn't be sure, but it looked like we were going faster than it felt, but that could just be a trick of the scenery. I was surprised when the flat nothingness that was the area around Keyes started to descend down a rocky slope. We were driving into a canyon? Were there any canyons near Keyes? This looked like the Kimberleys, but those were a six hour drive away. We had only been driving for just over two hours.

The car stopped next to a lagoon at the bottom of the canyon, a waterfall streaming down the sides. We had parked in the shade under a tree.

I hopped out of the car and looked around where we were in awe. This place was beautiful.

I looked back towards the Range Rover, to see that Oliver was standing behind it in the shade.

Of course, the enigma of Oliver and the sun.

"So are you sure you're ready to see this?" he asked. Although his voice was quiet, in the silence that surrounded us, he was perfectly clear.

"Yes," I whispered back, knowing he could hear me.

He breathed in and out deeply once, twice, then stepped out from underneath the protective shade of the tree.

It was beautiful.

The light shattered from his skin as though it was made up of a million tiny facets, rainbows being thrown across the scenery. He appeared to glow in the light, but he wasn't so bright as to be painful.

I couldn't take my eyes away from him.

He walked slowly towards me, as if worried that if he moved too quickly, I would run away.

He stopped when he was inches away from me, and brushed a tear from my cheek.

I hadn't realised I was crying.

"Are you ok?" he sounded anxious.

I looked up into his golden eyes.

"…it's just so beautiful…"

He cupped my face in his hand.

"No, you are beautiful."

And he leant down and kissed me.

It was a long time before I was able to talk again. Words could not express what I was feeling just then, but the silence seemed to be a comfortable one. I spent hours tracing every crease on Oliver's body (I had made him remove his shirt, if he asked, it was because I wanted to see him glitter some more, not because of his chest muscles…), learning every bend, every bump. While we lay beside the lagoon together, he just fondled my curls, which he had released from their ponytail.

Eventually, he asked me, "What are you thinking about?"

"Everything. There's just so much going through my head right now…"

He chuckled, and pulled himself upright.

"You must have a million questions," he said.

He was right, but which to ask first? Which ones would he answer?

"I'm not sure you want to hear my questions."

"But that's where you're wrong. I want to know _everything_ you're thinking. I want _you_ to know everything _I'm _thinking. Just ask and I'll answer." His eyes were pleading.

"Well, I guess I was wondering, about the whole blood thing…"might as well get the hard questions out of the way first.

"Hmm?"

"I know you don't drink human blood, but I was wondering, how can you stand to be around it if it's so tempting?"

"Ah," he smiled, "Practice. Lots and lots and lots of practice."

I waited. He wasn't getting out of that question so easily.

He sighed.

"You're right, human blood is very tempting to my kind. Most of us would not be able to be in such close proximity to it without giving in to the thirst. Considering my chosen career path, if I delved head first into whatever wound I was managing at that moment, that would be a little less than convenient. I decided a long time ago that I wanted to be a doctor. In fact, it was not really my idea, but the idea of another of my kind that abstains from human blood as I do. When I heard what he wanted to do, I was intrigued and joined him. We learnt medicine by night in the universities across Europe, looking over cadavers which thankfully did not have any blood. It was easier to learn when it was separated from the thirst. Carlisle, my friend, eventually thought we had learnt enough, and that if we ever wished to apply our knowledge, we would have to start developing our resistance to blood. We started by going to those chop shops of those who would call themselves surgeons at night, sifting through their trash to find bloody rags. We thought it would be… safer… to test our control away from live people."

He looked at my face, trying to work out whether I was horrified by these details or not.

"Well, basically from there, we slowly incremented the amount of temptation. From smears of blood, to volumes of blood, to small amounts of blood from living people… it's all about desensitising yourself. Much like what people with phobias do. If you slowly increase your exposure to the things you lack control with, eventually you get used to them.

"I don't even notice blood now. I'm not even attracted by the smell of it anymore."

"And Carlisle? How did he go?"

"Last I had seen his control had far surpassed mine, but then again I have gotten better in his absence. I'm fairly sure that he'd be unrivalled in his control, though."

"So if blood isn't a problem for you anymore, why am I so tempting?"

He sighed, "Because your blood smells so much better than the rest. You're _exactly_ what my body craves. Before now, I had only dealt with generic blood from generic humans. Neither of those apply to you."

I know it shouldn't feel so, but I felt special that my blood was special to him.

Morbid, I know.

"I don't even want to think about what my control would be like if even a drop of your blood spilled," he shook his head.

I was intrigued. All the information he had given me thus far had only served to give me more questions, questions I _knew_ were not appropriate and should not ask. But I had to know.

"What about… well… I am female, Oliver…" I blushed. I could not believe I was asking what sort of draw _that_ type of blood held for him! And he thought _he_ was the monster!

His eyes widened and looked at me. A few moments passed in silence and I wished I hadn't asked.

"I'm only drawn to living blood. Menstrual blood…" those words made me blush more - for God's sake I'm a doctor, I should grow up, "…does not really count in that category. It's long dead and contaminated by tissue and such like. It smells awful."

"Oh, well that's good then…"

He chuckled - oh God I was embarrassed! "Were you wondering if you would need to avoid me once a month?"

"It's not a stupid question," I grumbled to myself.

Oliver pulled me towards him and gave me a gentle squeeze.

"No, I guess from your perspective, it isn't. There's no need to be embarrassed. You look like a beetroot, you know."

More chuckles.

This was how he hoped to make me less embarrassed?

Oliver looked at my watch and sighed.

"It's past your lunchtime," he said as he released me and stood up. He offered a hand to me to help me up.

"Are we leaving now?"

"No, I just thought you should be fed, otherwise you'll be too weak to continue asking me your questions," he smiled at me again, "I never expected how enjoyable it would be for you to know these things about me, things I've kept secret for so long."

"I'm enjoying getting to know these things. They're helping me to understand you better…"

"…as long as the information you seek doesn't embarrass you," he smiled.

He reached into the car and pulled out a paper bag and passed it to me. It held an extraordinarily large amount of food. How much did he think I needed?

I smiled, "Thanks."

And with that, we sat down to eat.

As much as he promised that I would have the opportunity to ask more questions, it seemed for the rest of the afternoon, he was questioning me, asking me why I decided to come to Keyes, about my family (which I skipped over - I wanted to avoid more embarrassing topics), about my past (which I also skipped over - not sure how much information on my past boyfriend he needed), about everything.

He continued asking questions the entire way home, and I felt guilty that I was not being as honest with him as he had been with me, especially considering that my issues were so insignificant when compared to his.

The sun had set hours before we made it back to Keyes and I was exhausted. It had been such a long and tiring day, in more ways than one. I was embarrassed when Oliver lifted me from the car and carried me to my bed. He brushed my curls away from my face as he got ready to leave.

"Wait," I said, grabbing his arm, "I don't want you to go."

He smiled, "We have a life time to spend with each other, trust me, you won't miss me whilst you sleep."

"But I will when I wake up," I pouted.

And with that he shuffled me over and laid with me in my bed, his arm holding me tight.

"Sleep Kaia, there will be nothing to miss when you wake."

As I ate my breakfast that morning, after spending the night in Oliver's arms, he sat there watching me eat. I don't know why it is, but whenever he just _watched_ me, I always felt less at ease. It probably had something to do with him being able to stare at me endlessly without blinking, which is unnatural (for humans anyway). A more likely explanation was that this was one of the occasions where my boyfriend (I liked the way that sounded) felt less than human to me.

Either way, I felt the need to distract him from his meditation.

I stared down at my bowl of cereal, "So…what would happen if you ate normal food?"

His eyebrows snapped together and he started to grin, "What do you think would happen?"

"I dunno…"

He reached over and pried my bowl and spoon from my hands, and put a spoonful of cereal in his mouth, and swallowed, the smile getting larger across his face. Suddenly, he dropped what he held and grasped at his throat, gasping for air.

I felt my heart skip a beat. What had I done?

Before I had the chance to rise from my seat, the smile returned to his face, showing me the full compliment of his teeth, and he started to laugh.

"Not funny," I said, folding my arms across my chest in a huff.

"Oh it was, just a little bit," more chuckling. Just my luck, to get a vampire with a sense of humour, "What exactly did you think would happen?"

"I don't know. I was just wondering why if you could eat food, why you would go to the whole trouble of drinking animal's blood."

"Oh," he looked thoughtful, "I can _eat_ food, I just can't digest it. I have no problem with the physical act of swallowing, I just don't get any nutritional value out of it. It is sort of like, you could eat sand, but you could not live off it."

That made sense.

"So, if animal blood has nutritional value for you, then why don't other vampires drink animal blood instead of human?"

"Who says they don't?"

I shrugged, "I guess you just hear more stories of people getting their blood drunk than you do animals…"

"Well, you're right, we do, as a general rule, live off human blood rather than animal blood. I only know of two covens who do," he chuckled, "A friend of mine calls it being "vegetarian"."

"You still haven't answered my question."

He looked at me seriously, "Does it matter why I don't drink human blood?"

"Yes, to me it does. I figure it'll tell me something about what kind of man you are," I had him there. Oliver was all about trying to make me more comfortable with himself. Although he always protested that I would be better off without him, he never missed an opportunity to make himself look better in my eyes.

He sighed, rested his chin in his hand, and stared at me. I had already won, he just had to work out the wording.

"There are multiple reasons why an animal-based diet is less appealing to other of my kind than a diet of human blood. I guess the reason that is most pertinent, is that we have evolved to search out human blood. Our whole body is geared to do that. It smells better, our instincts search it out.

"Then there's the whole matter of taste. I guess you would compare the whole human to animal thing would be like the difference between wanting chocolate and brussel sprouts…"

"What, one tastes good the other gives you gas?"

"No, one tastes good, the other tastes really, really bad. The more herbivorous, the worse it tastes. My kind is into the whole self-gratification thing. Much like toddlers in that aspect, we go for what feels good rather than what is good for us.

"And that brings us to the next problem, animals have less nutritional value for us than people do. Our…strength…so to speak, is made stronger through our diets. I would have to consume in volume alone three times as much animal blood as someone else would get through human blood to have the same result. And because of it's lower nutritional content, it also means that I have to feed more frequently. This lifestyle choice of mine comes with a lot of sacrifices that very few of my kind are willing to make."

"Then why do it?"

"I wasn't born a monster, Kaia. It would be a pretty poor show on my behalf if I started to be one now, just because I had turned into one. Besides, this…talent…of mine, it allows me to know what my would-be prey would feel, and I couldn't live with that emotional burden. My talent also allows me to give a painless death to my chosen prey - they don't feel a thing."

"How could reading minds stop an animal from feeling pain?"

The look he gave me made it evident he hadn't meant to give as much away.

"Well…what I do is a little more complex than just reading minds…"

"…meaning…?"

"I read synapses, brain waves. I don't just hear a person's thoughts, I here every little biological process their brain is coordinating. Control of their heart beat, of their appetite…being able to interpret their thoughts came a lot later in the process. It was like learning how to read algebra."

"Oh," that did sound complex, "So… with me, is it just my thoughts you can't read, or can't you hear anything?"

"I can't hear anything. Not one single word, and you have no idea how mad that sometimes drives me."

We were getting away from the topic. The last thing I wanted was for this conversation to focus on me.

"So you haven't explained _how_ you stop your food from feeling pain."

"Oh, well…um…I sort of had an… accident… about a hundred years after I was born. I was in France, and well, I came across this poor girl getting assaulted. I got really mad, and next thing I knew, everyone passed out. Turns out, my thoughts, if they're strong enough, can stop other people's thoughts, only for a minute though," he hurriedly added, "It's sort of like an electromagnetic pulse with electronic equipment. Anyway, with practice, I've managed to distil this talent, so before I…feed…I knock the animal out. I feel it's kinder that way."

It suddenly clicked how Oliver's patients always conveniently passed out.

"Oh."

"I haven't scared you, have I?" The panic was real in his eyes.

"No! This whole conversation has been very informative."

"Any other questions you have for me?"

"Only about a million."

He looked out the window and sighed, "Well I'm afraid they're going to have to wait. You've got a visitor."

"I have a visitor? Who?"

"Ruth - who else comes over unannounced."

"And how do you know she's coming?"

He raised one eyebrow and tapped the side of his head when it was obvious I didn't get it.

He could hear her.

"Oh."

He smiled at me, the way I felt that parents smiled at their children. _That_'s not the type of smile I wanted.

"How long till she gets here?" I jumped up and started clearing the dishes from the table. My eyes swept around the room and I was horrified by what a mess it was.

Just then there was a knock at the door.

Wait - Oliver was here. My eyes flashed to my watch - it was eight am. How would I explain what Oliver was doing over at my house at eight am?

My mouth opened and shut like a fish.

Another knock, "Kaia, it's Ruth, you awake yet?"

"What do we do?" I mouthed at Oliver.

Another knock, "Kaia, are you in there?"

Oliver smiled at me, "They have to know sometime."

And before I could stop him, he walked over and opened my front door.

"Hello Ruth," he greeted warmly.

I froze in horror.

"Oh, Oliver, I didn't expect to see _you_ here…"

Oh God, everyone was going to know. Ruth's mind went _those_ places so much faster than anyone else. But then again, what was she meant to think? Oliver hadn't rung her yesterday like he always did, I hadn't had dinner with her like I always did, it was 8am, and he was answering my door.

I could die with embarrassment.

"Is Kaia in?"

"She's in the kitchen cleaning up from breakfast."

I hastily grabbed another bowel from the cupboard and poured half the left over cereal in it. If we were meant to be having breakfast, he would need a setting.

"Come on in."

Ruth walked in while I was standing by the sink, hyperventilating. It was one thing to know that this man was the one you wanted to spend the rest of your life with, a complete other for the people you work with to know that.

"Hi Ruth," I spun quickly to greet her, my good hand gripping the bench so tight my knuckles went white, "I had no idea you were coming over today."

"Well, I was just bringing some eggs over. I had no idea you had _company_."

Why did the way she said company make it sound so dirty?

Oliver chuckled and walked over to me, slinging an arm around my shoulder and kissing my hair. I could feel the look Ruth was giving us. I glared at him.

"Thankyou for the eggs Ruth," he replied on my behalf, his body quivering with suppressed laughter (why was my embarrassment so amusing to him?), "That was very thoughtful."

"Well, seeming you two are busy, I might leave you to it…"

"Oh no, I was just leaving. You two enjoy yourself," he spun me to face him, "I'll see you at dinner."

And with that, he leaned down and gently kissed me on the lips. I could feel his lips contorted into a grin. He would pay for this later.

And with that, he turned and left, chuckling to himself.

Oh God.

Ruth quickly walked over to me (although quick was a poor definition if you compared it to how Oliver could move), her mouth hanging open.

"Kaia Snow, you must tell me everything!"

Well, that whole conversation was so painful it wasn't worth reliving. Basically I gave her some generic information to explain why Oliver was there, and his behaviour - I could hardly say I found out he was a vampire and I'm in love with him. I tried to convince Ruth that it had only just happened, but when she did manage to say more than "Oh my God!", she kept repeating she _knew_ this was going to happen, and how she _knew _that we'd been trying to cover-up our relationship for a while.

When she did leave an hour later, I knew that by the time Oliver came back for dinner, everyone in town would know.

I was going to kill him.

Even though I tried to avoid leaving my house, I realised that I would need some food to cook if Oliver was going to be insistent on watching me eat again. I wasn't going to allow him to try and feed me again - not unless I wanted to sit through a nine course banquet. My budget wouldn't allow for that kind of food expenditure.

As I made the five minute walk to the grocery shop, I felt like everyone was watching me. Curse Ruth to hell. When I actually made it into the shop, I was greeted by Doug the cop, saying, "You and Dr Monroe eh?", and someone else in the shop whooped at me. When I was paying for my groceries, Margie said, "You cooking for Dr Monroe tonight, huh?"

I felt like I could die from embarrassment.

On the walk home, someone shouted out of a car window, "If you ever get sick of Dr Monroe, you can play doctors with me sweet heart."

Yes, Oliver was going to die tonight.

I opened the door to my house expecting that I was alone, and found Oliver sitting in my arm chair. He rushed over and yanked the bags of groceries from my hand, and rushed them back to the kitchen. This whole movement happened so quickly I wasn't sure it had.

Bloody vampire.

He swept around the kitchen, putting things away, then swept back to me. I had my arms folded across my chest.

"You're in a lot of trouble, you know."

"Why? They were going to find out anyway?"

"Yes, but it could have been a more gradual thing! You know, maybe some harmless flirting while I was at work, and work up from there. It didn't have to be that I went home with you the first Friday night after getting back from hospital!"

"Technically speaking, I went home with you, and it was Saturday night I stayed…"

"But don't you know what this makes me look like? They're going to think we're sleeping together! They're going to think I'm easy…"

His brows furrowed together, "Why would they think that?"

"Because what else would people think if two people who had never even gotten along together were suddenly spending the night over at each other's house?"

"But can't they tell by the way we look at each other… this is so much more than just a sexual thing!"

"These are humans, Oliver. The whole soul mate excuse doesn't really fly anymore."

He thought about that for a second.

"I'm so sorry. I should of discussed this with you first."

"Yes, you should have."

"But I just thought it was easiest. My car was outside - Ruth was bound to know."

I sighed as he hugged me to himself. It was hard to stay mad at him.

"Next time, you decide what information we disclose."

I liked it when he talked about us as a whole.

"I'm sorry, I forgot you're probably not used to this decade's social norms." I started going around the kitchen collecting what I needed to cook dinner, "I would be even more confused if I was asked to conform to the norms of when you came from. I don't even know how old you are…"

He went down and sat at the table, watching me cook.

"Do you really want to know?"

"I want to know everything about you, Oliver."

"Ok then, here we go…

"I was born in approximately 1590 in London. I cannot be exactly sure of the exact date, because time was not kept at all accurately then, but I was a teenager when the plague struck again in 1603.

"I was the son of a blacksmith, and I had three brothers and four sisters. Only two of my sisters were alive when the plague struck. My mother had died giving birth to my youngest brother, who died shortly afterwards. Life was short back then. And the poorer you were, the shorter it was. We weren't exactly well off, so to have three surviving children was actually a pretty good tally back then.

"Then the plague struck, which it did every generation or so back then. The only way to stop its spread was lockdown, and that was hardly an effective measure. We only realised that the plague had struck again when our neighbourhood was locked in. It was a terrifying thing, knowing that all of us could die.

"My sister Roberta, named for my father, died first, followed by Constance shortly thereafter. I tried to nurse them through their illness, but they did not have the condition to bear it…"

He put his head in his hands.

"Even after all my other human memories have faded away to being barely whispers, the images of my sisters dying and feeling helpless remain."

Oliver lifted his head from his hands to look at the ceiling.

"My father died shortly after Constance, she had always been his favourite. She reminded him the most of my mother. Losing her was like losing my mother all over again.

"My entire neighbourhood perished. Hundreds of people across the city did as well, but my neighbourhood bore the brunt. No one but me survived it. I hadn't even gotten sick.

"But I was locked in my neighbourhood, cursed to walk amongst the dead. I wished _I_ was dead,. The hunger and sorrow… it was too much for me. But I survived. Eventually when the streets were reopened, I was able to escape. No one wanted me around, they thought I was cursed.

"I lived on the streets of London for years, making a penny by singing for my supper. Even while I was human, I had the voice of an angel. It was my only asset.

"Lord Winston heard me singing at a pub he frequented one evening, and thought my voice was too pure to belong in the slums. He took me into his home, making me perform when he held dinners. He treated me well. As I grew older, I learned how to play the lute and pianoforte, so after my voice had broken, I was still able to perform for his guests. My voice was still beautiful, it's just that sopranos and castratis were the fashion back then.

"He decided when I was twenty-one that I should marry his daughter, Fiona. His health was declining and he wanted me to have some security after he had passed on. He considered me to be the son he never had."

My heart tightened - had Oliver loved someone else?

I think he must have noticed my tensing, cause he stopped his story and looked at me comfortingly.

"Marriage back then had a different meaning to what it does now. No one married for love - marriage was seen as a contract to benefit from. I barely knew Lord Winston's daughter. In fact, I only talked to her once during our engagement."

I relaxed just a little bit.

"It was the night before our wedding, and I was walking home from the church. Lord Winston had wanted to make sure that the clergy man had made all the arrangements. I heard this sound in an alleyway…it sounded like an animal was hurt. I walked down to check what it was…

"A pale man with red eyes was holding a woman I could only assume to be a prostitute, his mouth at her neck. He was very handsome, but something about him put me ill at ease. Then the whore's head rolled back listlessly, revealing the blood pouring from his mouth."

"I rushed over to them when I realised the woman was injured, I had not been raised to watch violence against a woman. I pushed him as hard as I could, but it was like hitting a wall.

"He growled at me angrily, dropping the woman and lunging for me…."

Oliver went silent. I could smell my food burning on the stove, but I was consumed by his story.

"A noise from outside the alley distracted him, and for some reason, he left me to die. I crawled away from the dead woman, hiding myself in a sewer and waited for death to come. But it didn't. Three days later, I had changed. I knew what I was and it disgusted me. The life I had known was over. So I fled London. I'm not sure I ever stopped running."

Oliver sighed and looked at me.

"My past is no topic to discuss over dinner. Don't let your meal be ruined on my behalf."

My mind was spinning, I was devastated at what had happened to Oliver. I brought my dinner over to the table and sat next to him, where he rested his head on my shoulder, like he was the one who needed support.

"The only blessing of what I am is that I've managed to live long enough to find you. After you leave the Earth, I will gladly leave it too."

I don't know why this statement didn't comfort me.

I ate dinner in silence.


End file.
